Athlete shot on Prairie View A&M campus

October 20, 2009 8:55:06 PM PDT

PRAIRIE VIEW, TX --

Police on the Prairie View A&M campus are looking for the gunman who shot a football player on campus over the weekend. It happened Saturday night after a party. And now, we're hearing from another student who saw what happened.

With a winning season in the works at Prairie View A&M, school spirit was at an all time high for Saturday's homecoming game. But what happened at after party later that night has some of the student body and football team bit shaken.

"Gunshots you could actually hear," said Trenton Johnson, vice president of the Student Government Association.

Johnson was inside the Billy Jay Nicks building at about 11pm. He and school staff say for some reason, tension grew in the crowd of about 4,000 people dancing to a DJ.

"There were a couple of scuffles, disputes, that led into some altercations," said Sheleah Hughes with Prairie View A&M.

That prompted security to shut down the dance party. But as everyone began exiting, gunfire sent partiers into a panic.

"Me and a few other students, we kept the doors shut because we didn't want any additional students to go outside while the gunshots were going on," said Johnson.

A Prairie View A&M football player, said to be a junior, was shot and it's not clear by whom.

"We do think it funneled from an altercation that started earlier," said Hughes.

Prairie View A&M say because of homecoming festivities, about 15,000 people were on campus Saturday, and not all were students.

"You don't know who is on your campus, although we have only one entrance and one exit," said Hughes. "You still don't know if those are all students, friends of students, those are all parents."

The student was flown to a Houston area hospital, returning to campus Sunday.

"We don't ever want something like this to happen again," said Johnson. "We were fortunate that the football player did not pass away."

And Prairie View police continue to investigate the shooting and are tracking several leads in hopes of finding the shooter.